Nearly 100 people turn out for 'Grown Up' Easter egg hunt

TROY - Peter Pan syndrome is alive and well in the Capital District, in a very, very positive way. There were nearly 100 young-at-heart Easter egg hunters at the inaugural "Grown Up" Easter Egg Hunt to benefit the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society this weekend.

And I was the organizer of the event.

Which, yes, probably makes me a bit biased to write this but who better to give all the ins and outs of planning this event - which ended up being a great success - in less than two weeks?

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I think we can all agree that participating in charitable causes is always a good thing. And when it involves getting heaps of assorted chocolate, Peeps, mini-liquor bottles, vouchers for beer, and gift certificates for local businesses, well, that just makes giving to charity that much better.

The idea for the adult Easter Egg Hunt came well before Andrea Googas with the local Leukemia & Lymphoma chapter asked me to be one of the Man & Woman of the Year Candidates as part of an annual fundraising campaign. The campaign has about a dozen well-connected people using their connections and ideas to earn as much for LLS in 8 weeks, from early March to early May. Other "candidates" include: Lisa Austin, Alex Carbone, Florence DeSantis, Jodi Hartman, Scott Hooker, Amy Jaffe, Michael Lanides, Javy Martinez, Sabrina Mosseau, Chris Pratt, Jeannine Trimboli, Renee Walrath, and Chris Wessel.

The adult Easter Egg Hunt, like most fun ideas, started as a joke - on Twitter. I was talking with some friends and saying how it'd be fun to have a "grown up" version of the time-old Easter tradition that has, for the most part, been a childhood holiday pastime. (I obviously use "grown up" very loosely.)

This joke later became fodder for fun newsroom banter with my co-workers and then, as my LLS campaign got started, I realized it really could be the foundation of an enjoyable yet charitable activity.

Once the resolve came to make this happen, next came the fun part: explaining to the city of Troy, candy shops, beer stores, and distributing companies what, exactly, an adult Easter Egg Hunt was.

Somehow, more than a dozen local businesses saw what I saw and donated, generously.

The city of Troy reserved the Prospect Park picnic pavilion for the event, and even donated their Easter Bunny suit also used at the city's annual kids' egg hunt.

I spent the week leading up to the event collecting boxes of Peeps, large fruit-filled chocolate eggs, lollipops, sour candies, white chocolate bunnies, leftover Easter cookies, gummies, one two-foot chocolate bunny, and more than 35 pounds of little chocolate eggs.

Added to this was ten 12-packs of beer, four cases of water, and eight dozen mini-liquor bottles, all donated.

As the event grew, I realized it might be more than just 25 of my friends as I was initially anticipating. And I started thinking back to all of the similar events I've covered with the paper in the past when, for two years, I was The Record's Saturday reporter. I knew we also needed food and music to keep the expected egg hunters happy. Two 24-cut pizzas were given to the event, as were two sub platters. My boyfriend, Jonathan Van Sickle, who used to be a DJ, contacted one of his friends who, with just a couple days' notice, was more than willing to alter his schedule that day to help.

With entertainment, food, and fillings for more than 700 colorful plastic eggs taken care of, the next challenge was getting the word out. Of course I used the social media, where the idea had its original origins, but I knew I had to look beyond my 3,400 Facebook and Twitter friends. All Over Albany, who I do some freelance work for, thought this would be something their readers would enjoy. The Times Union's Kristi Gustafson Barlette, who said she enjoyed egg hunting with her own family this past holiday, also blogged about it and a photographer was requested to cover it the day of the event.

When April 14 finally came, temperatures were in the 60s and it was blue skies. We couldn't have asked for a better day. The only initial issues people had were getting there, since the Congress Street construction was a bit of a barrier, and getting change for their cash donations since I did not get a chance to get change before the event and nearly everyone brought $20 bills for the $10 activity including $7 for the egg hunt, $2 for food, and $1 for water.

We also had to recruit a few people to hide last minute eggs but most did it without question. Like most of the people there, they just wanted to help out a good cause. In fact, many told me after the egg hunt that they and the organizations they're involved with would be interested in helping more next year.

One of the reasons I decided to help LLS was that my good friend Nicole's brother, Michael, had been affected by this type of cancer when he was a child. Now he's graduated Troy High School and attended Hudson Valley Community College. He is working on his dream of creating a comic book storyline. Michael Jensen and his family attended Saturday's event to show that there is hope for those with leukemia and lymphoma. And, with all the money collected from the event going to LLS and cancer research, that will give more hope for an eventual cure.

The egg hunt took place around the picnic pavilion, near it's parking lot, in the adjacent field, and over the nearby hill where the eggs and other goodies were hid in trees, in the tall grass, in horseshoe pits, or in plain sight. It was both refreshing and amusing to watch dozens of grown adults running around looking for Easter eggs, and reliving their childhood - only with alcohol.

Nearly all of the feedback I received was positive and I do intend to do this again next year.

It was interesting for me to go from covering events like this to actually organizing one. There is a lot that goes into this, but it's well worth it. We raised nearly $700 for charity.

A few more "events" are planned in the next couple weeks including a Swim A Thon at RPI this coming weekend, an ongoing ice cream flavor at Watervliet's Mac's Drive In in which 50-cents of every milkshake, cone, or sundae goes to LLS, and an LLS awareness activity in which Stewart's donated two of their Make Your Own Sundae kits - I'm still figuring out if that will be at Troy Night Out or at this weekend's Farmer's Market.

And, for anyone who wants to help next year at the Grown Up Egg Hunt, I can be reached via Twitter, email, or Facebook.